Zip Line Marketing Hits and Misses

Winner of the Goliath Award: Louisville Mega Cavern, Ky.

Generating hundreds or even thousands of reviews holds huge marketing potential. Most companies stop there. But I found one that’s going the extra mile to connect with customers and boost its marketing even more on TripAdvisor.

Ecstatic reviews merit responses as much as any other. Don’t be afraid to let your guard down and genuinely engage your customers.

When you look at Louisville’s profile, you’re arrested first by the sheer volume of reviews. They’re racing ahead of 3,000 entries, and 80 percent are rated “Excellent.”

But that’s not why I selected them for this award.

What’s more impressive about Louisville Mega Cavern’s TripAdvisor presence is that the manager recently started responding to all reviews. That’s something that any company can do, regardless of your number of reviews.

Of the last 192 reviews, Louisville’s manager, Jacque, has personally responded to 188 of them. Guess how many were rated 3 stars or lower? Only six.
While responding to reviews is considered a “best practice” in the industry, it’s more like a “best concept,” because very few zip tours or adventure parks execute it at scale.

Moreover, many operators merely focus on responding to negative reviews, but don’t consider the power of engaging with positive ones. Your company’s response to ecstatic customers is just as important for forming your tour’s culture and brand for a prospective guest.

I have high hopes that Louisville will set a lasting example for how zip lines and aerial parks can proactively respond to all customer reviews and shape their brands accordingly.

Winner of the Curve Ball Award: The Gorge Zipline, N.C.

There’s another platform out there where zip tours and aerial parks rack up customer reviews. It’s not Yelp; it’s not Google+; it’s Facebook. The winner of this award has six times as many Facebook reviews as TripAdvisor reviews!

The Gorge Zipline in Saluda, N.C., boasted nearly 700 Facebook reviews as of mid-June. Its secret? Simple: automated review emails.

After a tour ends, every guest gets an automatic email, with the option to leave a review on The Gorge’s review sites, including Facebook and TripAdvisor.